thereby created. In presence of full royal council Zawis exposed the condition of the country.
“According to my polyptic carefully compiled during the last two years,” explained Zawis, “instead of thirty-eight great towns there remain but nine.
“Instead of two hundred and nineteen towns of second class are to be found now but seventy-three; and our villages and hamlets have been reduced from fourteen hundred and eighteen to less than three hundred. On the happy return of the king not a mark remained in the treasury.
“Even the archives had been pillaged. We have not yet secured a full statement of the debts due to or from the crown.
“The crown lands have been alienated, some openly enclosed by greedy lords in order to extend their own domains, some seized under pretense of donation by old and new monastic orders. The revenues from the crown lands, hitherto the most regular and reliable source of income, have almost disappeared. The peasantry have wholly died out in many parts of Bohemia and Moravia and steps have been taken to transfer colonists into the vacant regions. Robbers long destroyed the hopes and the industry of merchants; but these banditti have felt the arm of power. The public accounts have been regularly submitted; and rarely have we succeeded in covering our expenses. Army there is none. Scarcely a nobleman can furnish the quota that his estate demands. The king’s interest compels the most careful suppression of all but the most needful expenses.”
